State Police identify two killed in Route 146 crashes

State Police identify two killed in Route 146 crashes

LINCOLN – The Rhode Island State Police have identified victims of two separate fatal accidents that occurred within four hours of each other on Route 146 on Wednesday, April 2.

Harrisville resident David W. Salois, 28, was killed after he was struck by a tractor trailer truck on Route 146 south in North Providence; and 89-year-old Marie Simone of Warwick died from fatal injuries she sustained after driving the wrong way down Route 146 south in Lincoln, according to a press release from Col. Steven G. O'Donnell, R.I. State Police superintendent and Department of Public Safety commissioner.

The first crash occurred at approximately 1:22 p.m. when, according to witnesses interviewed by police, Salois exited his Dodge minivan after stopping in the breakdown lane near the Mineral Spring Avenue exit, and entered the first travel lane directly in the path of the oncoming truck.

The report states he was semi-conscious and being attended to by members of the North Providence Fire Department when the state police arrived, but was later pronounced dead at Rhode Island Hospital.

Police have determined that neither speed nor impairment contributed to the accident, the report states, and truck driver Michael R. Hammond, 45, of Warwick, was not injured.

A section of the first travel lane was reportedly closed for two hours while members of the State Police Reconstruction Unit and Criminal Identification Unit conducted an investigation at the scene.

The second crash happened at 5:23 p.m. when Simone reportedly struck another vehicle head-on after traveling north in the southbound lanes of Route 146 just north of the Route 116 overpass.

The driver of the second vehicle, 30-year-old Joseph Brophy of Burrillville, sustained injuries that were not life-threatening and he was listed in stable condition at Rhode Island Hospital as of Thursday, police said.

Police said they received multiple 911 calls reporting the wrong way driver prior to the crash, and then after she reportedly crashed into the other vehicle in the second travel lane.

Troopers were assisted by members of the Lincoln police and fire departments. Police from the Lincoln Woods Barracks, Collision Reconstruction Unit and Criminal Identification Unit are investigating all possible causes that led to the collision, the report states.